This article is written by Divya Singh Yadav, Sneha Asthana & Vivek Yadav

On 14th June 2020, the 34-year-old actor, Sushant Singh Rajput was discovered dead at his Bandra house within the urban concentrate on the day, which was claimed to be an instance of suicide by the native police. Mumbai police appeared to have closed the case at by showing people it was a suicide. However, as time passed by and Sushant’s father started acting upon the case, various links were made with Sushant’s death and his manager, Disha Salian’s, who died on June 9th, 2020, by accidentally falling off from the 14th floor from her fiancés’ residence in Malad. The short gap of just five days between both their deaths stirred up several rumours and conspiracies which instigated the Mumbai Police to investigate the case further. Several opinions arose on social media platforms and by Television media. 

1. Heaps of political motives are being imputed within the case right from the word go. From the alleged involvement of high-profile politicians and screenland biggies in Mumbai to the approaching state elections, all types of conspiracy theories are floating around. Nausea has defendant the BJP of attempting to destabilise its government in a geographic area. A radical probe can prove whether or not these theories have any substance or are mere conjectures?  
2. Some individuals, deliberately or accidentally, are attempting to form a divide between the states. Rhea is being branded as a Bengali lady who experienced necromancy to own complete management over a Bihari boy’s life, whereas Sushant’s family has been stereotypic, like several different Bihari family, as being ‘toxic’, that couldn’t settle for a giant town lady as his girlfriend. The probe can place finish to such ‘toxicity’ being peddled within the property right. 
3. The probe will bring out the reality of whether or not the alleged suicide or murder of Sushant’s former manager Disha Salian is connected into Sushant’s death. Sushant was found dead solely six days once Disha’s end. It’ll additionally unravel the reality regarding the alleged involvement of influential individuals during this case. 
4. It’ll additionally finish to the endless rounds of mudslinging between the police and therefore the politicians of 2 states. Shivsena’s leader has alleged that Sushant was displeased together with his father owing to his second wedding. In contrast, a state BJP leader has concerned a narco check of the Shiv Sena leaders for his or her involvement within the case. 
5. It’ll additionally settle a big jurisdiction question of whether or not state police were well among its statutory rights to lodge FIR within the case and advocate the CBI probe once their geographic area counterparts had not lodged an FIR in the 1st place over the actor’s “unnatural death”. 
6. It’ll additionally place screenland below scanner and answer the question if the alleged favouritism within the industry had something to try to with Sushant’s death under alleged depression?  
7. It’ll additionally build it clear whether or not geographic area police were doing the investigation in right earnest or were attempting to scuttle the case struggling since the day, as alleged by Sushant’s family?  
8. Finally, honest probe ought to guarantee justice to Sushant, his family, and his admirers if there was immorality so behind his death? And it’ll additionally offer justice to Rhea Chakraborty if she had no role to play some within the unfortunate incident. 

The Mumbai police began to put in all efforts to find out the truth only after an FIR was filed by Sushant Singh Rajput’s father K.K Singh in Bihar. The Mumbai police then put their nose to the grindstone to find out all angles of the reason for Sushant’s death. 

Role of Mumbai Police: Mumbai police, in this case, had the power to act under section 174 of CRPC. The police also said that all the instances and the pieces of evidence clearly stated that his death was suicide, and also there was no accused person, and hence there was no need for an FIR.

They started an investigation after his death and concluded that Sushant’s death was a suicide. The police state that the postmortem report was submitted at the Bandra police station. The deputy commissioner of Mumbai, on 22nd June 2020, said that the cause of his death was asphyxia due to hanging. The final post mortem was submitted on 25th June, which confirmed that Sushant’s death was due to hanging. And on 3rd August, police commissioner of Mumbai; Param Bir Singh said that the investigations of the death of Sushant and his ex-manager Disha Salian were not connected to each other.

Mumbai police also claimed that Sushant initially tried to hang himself with the help of a belt, but when that did not work out, he used a green kurta. They also said that due to the discrepancy of Sushant’s height and the distance between him and the fan, Sushant hanged himself in an inclined position.

On 3rd August, the police commissioner of Mumbai stated that there was no direct transfer of money from Sushant’s bank account to Rhea and there was no misappropriation of his funds. The police had investigated 56 people until 4th August.

Initially, the Mumbai police said the CCTV of Sushant’s home was not working on that day but on 3rd August; they stated that they had access to his CCTV footage and according to the recording there was no party at his house a day before his death.

Soon after the Mumbai police began investigating, there was news regarding K.K Singh, Sushant Singh Rajput’s father had filed an FIR against Rhea Chakraborty in Bihar. 

On July 25th, Sushant Singh Rajput’s 74 years old father, Krishna Kishore Singh, lodged an FIR in Rajiv Nagar Police Station, Patna, against Rhea Chakraborty, Rhea’s mother, Sandhya Chakraborty, father, Indrajit Chakraborty, brother Showik, house manager Samuel Miranda and business manager Shruthi Modi on the grounds of Section 306 of the Indian Penal Code – abetment of suicide.  The charges mentioned in the FIR also include:

1. Section 306 – abetment of suicide
2. Section 341 – punishment for wrongful restraint
3.  Section 342 – punishment for wrongful confinement
4. Section 380 – theft in a dwelling house 
5. Section 406 – punishment for criminal breach of trust 
6. Section 420 – cheating and dishonestly inducing delivery of property.

Mr KK Singh has also invoked provisions of the Mental Health Care Act alleging that the ‘machinations’ used by Rhea and her family led to Sushant Singh Rajput’s suicide.

Mr Singh had also claimed that Rhea Chakraborty was handling Sushant’s bank accounts and when the balances were dropping low, she had left with cash, jewellery, laptop, credit card, its PIN and password and essential documents and doctors’ receipts. The FIR also claimed that Rs 15 Crores were siphoned off from Sushant’s account into accounts of unknown persons.

He claimed that Sushant was also threatened by Rhea to show doctor’s receipts to the media to prove him mad, as a result of which he would not get any further work.

Mr KK Singh has alleged that Rhea Chakraborty had only befriended Sushant to further her own career using his contacts and that her parents helped her “purloin the assets of my son worth crores of rupees and started interfering in all aspects of his life.”

He also alleged in the FIR that Rhea convinced Sushant to leave is own residence claiming that his house was haunted.

Mr Singh goes on to allege that Rhea blackmailed Sushant and threatened to make his medical record public due to which Sushant almost gave up his cinema career to settle down in Coorg.

Following the FIR, a team of 4 from the Bihar police reached Mumbai for starting an investigation of the case on the same day and on 31st July, the Enforcement Directorate filed an Enforcement Case Information Report against Rhea Chakraborty under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act.

When the Bihar Police team landed in Mumbai, Patna Central Superintendent of Police, Mr Vinay Tiwari was sent to quarantine till the 15th of August in compliance with the State Guidelines of quarantining all domestic flyers. The Bihar police team had, however, collected statements of Sushant’s ex-girlfriend, Ankita Lokhande, his sister, his cook and his friends and colleagues. The team also applied to the Crime Branch to seek assistance from the Mumbai police in collecting information regarding Sushant’s financial accounts. The investigation from both the states together led to a tussle, thereby resulting in controversies regarding elections political moves.

However, on 29th July, Rhea Chakraborty moved the Supreme Court seeking the transfer of the FIR from Bihar to Mumbai because no action of the case had arisen in Bihar; therefore Bihar does not hold jurisdiction to probe the matter. Instead, the Mumbai police should be investigating. Until the plea was decided, Nitish Kumar, Chief Minister of Bihar, on public pressure, recommended CBI investigation into the matter. On August 19th, the Supreme Court pronounced the verdict and transferred the case to the CBI and validated the FIR that was filed in Bihar.

CBI had taken over the probe on 7th August after the centre had issued a notice after the Bihar government’s recommendation. Then CBI had re-registered the case against Sushant’s girlfriend Rhea, her mother, father, brother, Sushant’s ex-manager and his flat-mate and others based on the complaint made by Sushant’s father earlier with Bihar police on 25th July. 

On 19th August, the supreme court of India allowed CBI to probe into Sushant Singh Rajput’s death.

The CBI investigation was allowed by the SC due to the following reasons:

1. Mumbai police had not investigated the case in a bonafide manner

The court had observed that the police was investigating the case under section 174 of CRPC, which has a limited scope, and hence no proper investigation could be done. 

2. Patna police had the jurisdiction to investigate the case

The FIR lodged by Bihar police was valid and was considered to be crucial for the case it was considered necessary to look into the matter. Sushant’s father had filed a complaint based on criminal breach of trust and misappropriation of money, and therefore, the incident’s consequences would arise in Patna too.

3. An independent organisation’s investigation necessary to avoid conflict between the two states

The court had observed that there were conflicts between the governments of both the states, and a lot of allegations were made that the Mumbai police did not do an excellent job in investigating the case.

The judgment said that both the states were making allegations that there was political interference into the matter, and the validity of the investigation was in question. 

4. Justice for Rhea and Sushant’s family

The court also was in the opinion that the actor had died long before the world could realise his full potential. And the court added that Rhea herself wanted CBI investigation.

5. To avoid uncertainty due to multiple investigations

The court said that one organisation should be in charge of investigating to avoid confusion about the case.

The court had denied Rhea’s request to transfer the investigation to Mumbai police stating that the provision 406 of CRPC does not grant the power to the supreme court to transfer investigation from one state to another when the matter is only at the investigation stage.

CBI had divided its team into three parts to investigate the matter. The main interrogation and investigation of the accused and other people involved in the matter will be done by the team led by Nupur Prasad (superintendent of police). The deputy Inspector general (DIG) Suvej Haq will be in charge of coordinating with Mumbai police in collecting all the documents regarding the case.

Since the CBI probe has begun, various pieces of evidence have appeared in the open convincing people of murder. The case has highlighted call records, text messages, drug traces, political links, Bollywood Mafia and several other matters. If the world ever knows the truth behind the case, then it could be very detrimental for some of the most influential people of the country. Terror links have also been traced, and the entire film industry has been put under the spotlight through the entire investigation. Remarks about Rhea’s character, her family and her career have also been made by the media channels to create bias.

However, the legal justice system does not depend on such remarks and works on a proof. Several questions need to be answered. 

1. Why was no action taken once Rajput’s family had alerted in Feb. that his life might be in danger?  
2. What came of the probe in Rajput’s former manager, Disha Salian’s, case who died six days before Sushant underneath mysterious circumstances?  
3. Why is not anyone talking and concerning the missing CCTV footage, the duplicate keys, and therefore the fifty SIM cards?  
4. Are Rajput’s friend Siddharth Pithani‘s statements inconsistent with the menage staff’s?  
5. How did Rhea manage to rent the foremost costly professional person to assist her case?  
6. Did Rhea resist Bihar Police’s involvement, and was geographical region government against the CBI probe?  
7. Why is that the IPS officer sent from Bihar unbroken in quarantine?  
8. Is there political involvement within the case on the far side mere suspicion?  
9. Why was it declared an ‘open and shut’ suicide case inside minutes of Sushant Singh Rajput’s body was found?  
10. Why are details of Sushant Singh Rajput’s medical and treatment reports accessible within the public domains? 
11. Did Sushant Singh Rajput have mental health issues? 
12. Was there a party the night before Sushant took his life? 
13. Was Aditya Thackeray ever at the alleged party? 
14. Did Salman Khan scold Sushant for ‘misbehaving’ with Sooraj at a party? 
15. What happened to all the ‘nepotism’ and ‘Bollywood mafia’ debates? 
16. Why were big Bollywood names dragged into the investigation in the first place? 
17. Did Rhea Chakraborty take Rs 15 crore of Sushant Singh Rajput’s money? 
18. Did Sushant’s relationship with his family turn sour over the years? 
19. Did Steve Huff speak to Sushant Singh Rajput’s spirit, or was it a sham? 

A stricter probe and continuous questioning are what is required. India has seen sudden deaths of actors like Jiya Khan and Sridevi as well. They remained mysteries for the nation too. Commenting on Sushant’s death, Jiya Khan’s mother has tweeted in support for the CBI probe claiming that she is absolutely sure that politics and the Bollywood mafia are involved in the death of Sushant as they were in the death of her innocent daughter. She believes there are people so influential in the industry that cannot tolerate such competition and threaten innocent people to give in to the apparent filthy politics. Unlike Jiya and Sridevi’s case, the country today, especially with the help of the media, strives to find the truth behind Sushant’s death. 

The certainty of an answer in the coming times is mild, but there is hope to find out if what actress Kangana claims to be the game of the Bollywood Mafia is in fact true. The social media attention on the case has definitely led our forces to fight this one out and bring justice to who deserves it.